Macro

After a traumatic few years catalysed by the annexation of Crimea and the ensuing civil conflict with its easternmost regions, Ukraine has developed a certain degree of flexibility in managing a series of shocks encountered since. But a lack of progress on crucial reforms, political mismanagement, and consistent lack of access to credit for key sectors like agriculture threaten the progress achieved so far.

The issuers, borrowers and mediators of the most innovative and outstanding debt capital market deals on the continent to be lauded at the prestigious awards ceremony.
Winners: Latin America Deals of the Year Awards 2018

Brown Brothers Harriman: produced the following ratings model to assess relative sovereign risk in Frontier Markets. A country’s score directly reflects its creditworthiness and underlying ability to service its external debt obligations.

Chilean politics is often seen as a bellwether for deeper shifts occurring across the continent’s political scene. The recent election of the “old new” president Sebastián Piñera is in line with the apparent swing to the right seen in recent years – but, more importantly, indicates that politics in Latin America is becoming more nuanced, predictable and mature.

Emerging Market FX ended Friday on a mixed note, as risk assets recovered a bit from broad-based selling pressures. Best Emerging Market performers on the week were ZAR, PHP, and CNY while the worst were COP, RUB, and ARS. Besides the risk-off impulses still reverberating through global markets, we think lower commodity prices are another headwind on EM.

With fresh forecasts predicting a deceleration in the country’s economic contraction and borrowers making fresh strides in the local credit market, Nigeria is poised to make strong gains in 2018. Transforming those gains into longer-term sustainable growth will depend heavily on the country’s commitment to reforms, but with elections in the offing and oil prices rising, some analysts question its resolve for staying on the reform path.

The decline in the Dollar versus Emerging Markets (EM) currencies began two years ago with more room to run, in our view. The unwinding of QE policies in the coming years will continue to weigh on the Dollar, and EM stands to benefit as capital inflows to EM ease important financial constraints. This should unleash stronger domestic demand and eventually more rate hikes than the Fed will deliver.

The ability for real estate firms to raise long-term liquidity depends on a complex set of interrelated factors – interest rates and pricing, tenor availability, asset liquidity, and the health and sophistication of the mortgage market, to name a few. Benson Ajayi, CFO at Mixta Africa, one of the continent’s leading real estate firms speaks with Bonds & Loans about how the company is navigating these factors to optimise its capital structure.

Over the past three years, the Central Bank of Russia has done an impressive job of staving off financial crisis while continuing to consolidate the country’s bloated banking sector. But as the state’s share in the sector approaches 70%, questions are being asked about the sustainability of its approach and the risks for private lenders, particularly those headquartered abroad.

With Zimbabwe’s infamous revolutionary-turned-dictator Robert Mugabe out and one of his main rivals left to pick up the pieces of an economy in tatters, the country’s prospects are anything but clear. Analysts are optimistic that policymakers can find a path to normalisation – creating significant opportunities for international and regional lenders, and the country’s credit markets, in the process. Tough decisions will need to be made.